In its second such agreement this week, Microsoft has struck a deal under which it will extend amnesty to a company that's using what the software maker claims is patented Microsoft intellectual property embedded in the open source Linux computer operating system. Under a deal with LG Electronics, disclosed late Wednesday, Microsoft will forgo any Linux-related patent claims against the South Korean electronics manufacturer. In return, Microsoft will gain access to certain intellectual property produced by LG.

I'm sure that what Microsoft wants. But there's another issue alluded to in the article. Microsoft may be racing to get ahead of GPL3. So maybe it's Microsoft that has the "Sword of Damocles" (PLan's analogy) hanging over its head.

MS _adores_ GPL3, it _wants_ GPL3 as soon as possible and it wants GPL3 to be as exclusionary as possible.

Then it can turn to businesses and say, "C'mon, you don't want to use software that is licences under GPL3 do you? Why that gives those smelly longhairs the right to all your code, invalidates all you patents and Stallman will come in at night and rape the company cat".

MS couldn't give a twopenny shit about what happens to Novell, Xandros etc. after GPL3 - they're just so much toilet paper.

And GPL3 will fragment the Linux codebase into two incompatible halves, to the disadvantage of developers and folks trying to keep their licences in line. That'll suit MS down to the ground.

Oh no sirree, LS is crazy for GPL3, and all these shenanigans are designed to provoke the FSF to release GPL3 as soon as possible and make it as tight as possible.

And GPL3 will fragment the Linux codebase into two incompatible halves,...

Unfortunately, that is a possibility. And maybe you are right that MS is expecting it to happen. So maybe their current actions are simply intended to goad infighting amongst the principals of free software, whom they no-doubt view in they way you have depicted Richard Stallman.

But I am hopeful that whatever Microsoft thinks, expects and wants will be held at arm's length and not be allowed to affect the course of free software.

""" And GPL3 will fragment the Linux codebase into two incompatible halves, to the disadvantage of developers and folks trying to keep their licences in line.
"""

That was a real danger, and my main objection to GPLv3 last year. However, as of draft 3, the FSF really seemed to start listening to the criticisms and took action to address them instead of just blithely claiming that the critics didn't understand the license.

I believe that we have averted most of the damage that might have been done.

It will still cause some needless license fragmentation. But I think that the danger has been reduced from the "catastrophic" variety to the "damned nuisance" variety.

As things stand, the advantages may actually outweigh the disadvantages, in the long term.